EA says goodbye to the Online Pass, we say good riddance

From almost the moment of its unveiling back in 2010, EA's controversial policy of charging buyers of preowned games an extra $10 to access online features has drawn outright ire from customers. That didn't stop EA from expanding the system to all of its online games and even some single-player games, though. So it's a bit surprising that EA has now decided to completely discontinue the program for all upcoming and current games.

EA announced a few weeks ago that it would be discontinuing Online Passes in upcoming games. But savvy NeoGAF posters recently noticed that the Online Passes for many previous EA games had also been reduced to a bargain price of $0 on Xbox Live. EA has now confirmed that it will be eliminating the Online Pass fee for all current games on all platforms via updates rolling out over the next few weeks.

Why the about-face? EA VP of Corporate Communications Jeff Brown was blunt in an interview with Game Informer. "It never really caught on," he said. "People didn't like it. People told us that they didn't like it and you know, we went through a cycle and we're about to put out some new games and we just decided not to do that anymore."

Rather than milking used game buyers, EA seems to have realized it can make much more money selling small items to players through microtransactions. The popular "Ultimate Team" feature for FIFA 12brought in $108 million for the company in a single year, and the program has since expanded to other EA Sports games. Microtransactions have also been creeping into single-player EA games like Dead Space 3 of late, and the company recently had to walk back executive comments that it would introduce them in all of its future games.

Keep in mind that current unconfirmed reports suggest Microsoft could be building a small retailer fee into used game sales on the Xbox One, revenue which will be shared with the game's publisher. If this is true, it could help partially fill the revenue gap left behind by the Online Pass system in a way that doesn't direct customer ire directly toward EA.

Of course, today's news is of little comfort to used game buyers who already paid $10 to access online features for their current EA games (and it seems doubtful that EA will be offering them a refund). And EA is only one publisher; companies like Sony, Ubisoft, and Warner Bros. have shown no signs of wavering in their commitment to similar programs. Still, it's good to see that customer resistance to these programs, both via online forums and via customers' wallets, can eventually have an effect on the policies of big publishers.

lol no way this is a company realizing they were wrong. This is a PR stunt because they know they are going to re-coop the money when the Xbox One/PS4 come out and Microsoft as well as publishers will setup the system to make money when the games are SOLD, never mind when a user wants to play the stupid thing. Anyone who thinks this is a goodwill gesture is out to lunch, IMO

I have a feeling this has more to do with Microsofts new "plan" to charge for used games, than it has to do with EA having a change of heart. After events over the last few years EA will not be getting my business until they do a 180.

Until then I will stick with independent developers and publishers that listen and interact with their customers.

I figured companies like EA would go the way of Steam via Xbox & PS4. You purchase a game, it simply registers it in your console's online library under your user id. You can't resell the game, trade, whatever ... it's just yours. The xbox & ps4 would just be hubs that consolidate games from various vendors and whether you "own it" or not.

Steams been out for... what... 5 years? 10? Models worked pretty well for PC, and sort of killed the PC game reselling market. Surprised consoles haven't copied it by now. The problem is each game vendor is trying to recreate their own Steam (eg: EA's Origins). They need to stop doing that, and just consolidate their lib's under the console they support. That's why Steam is so popular ... it's a lib based on what your PC can play, not a lib just of Valve games, and then having to sign into different libs for other game companies. That would be a nightmare. IT's why Steam works and EA Origins sucks.

Whoever made the go-ahead decision on Online Passes at EA should be fired for incompetence. This exec should have asked himself this simple question before proceeding:

Quote:

The top online console games (Call of Duty and Halo) are kicking our asses. Yet they do not use Online Pass strategies. Why is that?

I'll give you a hint: It's not because those publishers love their customers so much.

The number one thing that keeps people from trading in their console game (and moving it into an alternate economy that publishers like EA don't participate in) is a robust multiplayer component, where gamers will play with their friends for months after the single-player game is complete. If a behavior (online play) is good for you, you want to encourage that behavior. You don't fucking tax it!!!

Online passes actively discourage online play. Many second owners won't pay the $10 fee for an online pass. Many first owners find it a pain to dig the code out of the package and enter it, and just end up not trying the multiplayer component. These players trade the game in sooner. Less players online means a less compelling multiplayer component, which means even the online players will trade in the game sooner. In every conceivable way, Online Passes are a loser for EA.

This was obvious from the day that EA announced Online Passes. As I said, someone should lose their job over this.

I can honestly say I'm not so extremely against online passes, at that rat however... if it would be something like less than $1 and a guarantee the servers will be up for minimum 6 months after purchase... and not mandatory for SP part of game..

EA however has a LONG way still to get back their "not so horrible" rep they had a few years ago... And I can't think of any possibility of them becoming "nice" or "good"...Now days I can't think of anything good to say about them without having to add "however..." or "but.."...

lol no way this is a company realizing they were wrong. This is a PR stunt because they know they are going to re-coop the money when the Xbox One/PS4 come out and Microsoft as well as publishers will setup the system to make money when the games are SOLD, never mind when a user wants to play the stupid thing. Anyone who thinks this is a goodwill gesture is out to lunch, IMO

This. This. THIS.

People thinking that this is a good thing or giving ""light points" - why the hell are you so naive?

They are only doing this because now blocking of used games will be included in the new consoles by deault so it's simply no longer necessary for them to do it any more as it will be happening automatically anyway.

EA is certainly not going to do something that the people who buy their games would profit of. When it looks like they are, it's just a matter of waiting for the other shoe to drop and for the truth to be revealed, that's all.

Rather than milking used game buyers, EA seems to have realized it can make much more money selling small items to players through microtransactions.

This might still EA's biggest problem, especially since many of their "small items" are not so small, and their "microtransactions" not so micro. In fact, I'm much more understandable about them recouping a mere $10 from a used game than I am about being double-charged for incomplete games with 0-day DLC, and in which the immersion of my play experience is continually disrupted with reminders of how they're still gunning for my wallet.

EA gets to look like they are changing their ways while offloading the money that the online passes got them onto the likes of Microsoft and Sony who will be implementing some form of used game fee.

Personally I still need more details on the used game fees to make a final judgement on how that system is going to affect me or the industry as a whole. A lot of people are jumping to wild conclusions, which I think underscores the relative immaturity of the gaming community.

lol no way this is a company realizing they were wrong. This is a PR stunt because they know they are going to re-coop the money when the Xbox One/PS4 come out and Microsoft as well as publishers will setup the system to make money when the games are SOLD, never mind when a user wants to play the stupid thing. Anyone who thinks this is a goodwill gesture is out to lunch, IMO

This. This. THIS.

People thinking that this is a good thing or giving ""light points" - why the hell are you so naive?

Why are you so abrasive? This action, alone, is good. The follow-up action of getting charged by MS is the dark action.

I figured companies like EA would go the way of Steam via Xbox & PS4. You purchase a game, it simply registers it in your console's online library under your user id. You can't resell the game, trade, whatever ... it's just yours. The xbox & ps4 would just be hubs that consolidate games from various vendors and whether you "own it" or not.

Steams been out for... what... 5 years? 10? Models worked pretty well for PC, and sort of killed the PC game reselling market. Surprised consoles haven't copied it by now. The problem is each game vendor is trying to recreate their own Steam (eg: EA's Origins). They need to stop doing that, and just consolidate their lib's under the console they support. That's why Steam is so popular ... it's a lib based on what your PC can play, not a lib just of Valve games, and then having to sign into different libs for other game companies. That would be a nightmare. IT's why Steam works and EA Origins sucks.

Steam also regularly has some quite brilliant sales that are kind of like the used games that used to be sold at stores, only cheaper, I don't think consoles have anything that's really similar.

EA, after realizing how much they liked f#@king and liked honey, decided they would try f#@king beehives. They attempted this for a protracted length of time. However, according to an EA representative, "It never really caught on. Bees didn't like it. Bees told us that they didn't like it and you know, we went through a cycle and we're about to f#@k some new beehives and we just decided not to do that anymore."

lol no way this is a company realizing they were wrong. This is a PR stunt because they know they are going to re-coop the money when the Xbox One/PS4 come out and Microsoft as well as publishers will setup the system to make money when the games are SOLD, never mind when a user wants to play the stupid thing. Anyone who thinks this is a goodwill gesture is out to lunch, IMO

This. This. THIS.

People thinking that this is a good thing or giving ""light points" - why the hell are you so naive?

Why are you so abrasive? This action, alone, is good. The follow-up action of getting charged by MS is the dark action.

Because it's not a change in ripping off users, it's a change in how it's being done. Once EA stands up for used games and lending games to friends without fees, sure, then it's good.

Rather than milking used game buyers, EA seems to have realized it can make much more money selling small items to players through microtransactions. The popular "Ultimate Team" feature for FIFA 12 brought in $108 million for the company in a single year, and the program has since expanded to other EA Sports games.

So rather than one anti-consumer content lock, they're going to use another anti-consumer content lock? FIFA games used to let you pick a 'fantasy football' team (for playing against mates or whatever) for free but modern, shitty EA decided to turn that feature into a real-money scratchcard game.

I'm gonna go against the trend here and say that I was okay with the online pass. Unlike other forms of media, keeping multiplayer servers going has an ongoing post-release cost and used game players do not contribute to that cost.

If companies continue with the microtransaction trend, I for one will stop playing these games. I will never pick up Dead Space 3 for this reason. DLC is bad enough. They purposefully lock stuff out of the game just to milk their customers. Do I want pay $5 for "Horse armor"? No thanks.

Maybe this is why there are slumping industry sales. Customers are tired of being ripped off.

lol no way this is a company realizing they were wrong. This is a PR stunt because they know they are going to re-coop the money when the Xbox One/PS4 come out and Microsoft as well as publishers will setup the system to make money when the games are SOLD, never mind when a user wants to play the stupid thing. Anyone who thinks this is a goodwill gesture is out to lunch, IMO

This. This. THIS.

People thinking that this is a good thing or giving ""light points" - why the hell are you so naive?

Why are you so abrasive? This action, alone, is good. The follow-up action of getting charged by MS is the dark action.

Because it's not a change in ripping off users, it's a change in how it's being done. Once EA stands up for used games and lending games to friends without fees, sure, then it's good.

Exactly. If the EA move was done in a vacuum, whatever I guess, righting a wrong. But its not. They are doing this now to seem like the cool guys again because they know order will be restored (well, their order) within a few months... if anything they are just stopping it now so they stop printing the coupons to put in the game boxes so that their 1-800 number isn't flooded in a few months when the system becomes obsolete...

It doesn't really matter. The policy of deliberately gimped games designed to bleed you with micro-transactions, Day 1 DLC ripped from games, nearly full-game price (yet short) xpacs and deliberate franchise churning for no purpose but to bleed the customers have so turned me off of EA games that I won't even buy them used.

Then there is the horrible release quality of their top-franchises. And, of course, the abusive, annoying DRM and crappy Origin store.

So, yeah, they don't charge for used games any more. Big whoop! I've bought, maybe, four used games in the last decade because they were replacements for old games that were lost and I couldn't find new.

I'm gonna go against the trend here and say that I was okay with the online pass. Unlike other forms of media, keeping multiplayer servers going has an ongoing post-release cost and used game players do not contribute to that cost.

Given that for each person buying a game used there is one fewer person using the copy they bought new, in what way are the used gamers using something that has not been paid for?

keeping multiplayer servers going has an ongoing post-release cost and used game players do not contribute to that cost.

EA's servers are mostly match-making servers, though (the Battlefield series may be the only notable exception - all the rest are peer to peer games). They can keep one set of servers running for ALL current and future games, and it will sort itself out fine. The bulk of the traffic will be current games, and the bandwidth requirements for that sort of thing is pretty small.

Nope, still not buying your games unless you relent and put them on Steam. I'm still waiting to play Mass Effect 3 but I'd rather pirate it than sign up to Origin.

I never can understand why EA plays hardball and only puts their PC titles on Origin. There are still ways to convince players to switch; for instance, Allow your titles on Steam but never put them on sale and do not include ultimate or GOTY editions on Steam. This would be enough for hard line pirates not to have an excuse in torrenting the game (we all know people will still have an excuse though), and at the same time you could offer incentives to buy the product on Origin. One possible scenario is that all digital titles on Origin are $49.99 when they're first released and all DLC is 50% off with periodic sales of games every now and again.

Of course, this would rely on Origin not being a total POS of an application in general.

lol no way this is a company realizing they were wrong. This is a PR stunt because they know they are going to re-coop the money when the Xbox One/PS4 come out and Microsoft as well as publishers will setup the system to make money when the games are SOLD, never mind when a user wants to play the stupid thing. Anyone who thinks this is a goodwill gesture is out to lunch, IMO

This. This. THIS.

People thinking that this is a good thing or giving ""light points" - why the hell are you so naive?

Why are you so abrasive? This action, alone, is good. The follow-up action of getting charged by MS is the dark action.

So, basically, what you're saying is that since we'll still be getting charged by EA but not DIRECTLY by EA then we should give EA credit for doing good? Yea, you lost me there.

Anyone else predicting the following coming from EA after this holiday seasons?

"There is no fee to play used games that WE charge. Unfortunately Microsoft/Sony have a fee for accessing titles because of the way its linked to accounts. Of course we would love to do whats best for the customer but our hands are tied here. Sure we negotiated a healthy share of the profits but that was to just discourage them from...charging...more...somehow?"

I'm gonna go against the trend here and say that I was okay with the online pass. Unlike other forms of media, keeping multiplayer servers going has an ongoing post-release cost and used game players do not contribute to that cost.

I'm going to assume the best and say you are extraordinarily naive and young. Really young.

Anybody on this board remember hosting servers so you, your friends, and half the planet could play multiplayer for FREE??????

Kyle Orland / Kyle is the Senior Gaming Editor at Ars Technica, specializing in video game hardware and software. He has journalism and computer science degrees from University of Maryland. He is based in the Washington, DC area.